PAOGA - Privacy & Trust in the Digital Age

February 22, 2011

The digital revolution has resulted in many document based transactions being replaced by electronic authorisation, rather than signed documents. For instance credit card authorisation, tax returns and Companies House returns are all now done ‘online’. However the majority of legal and financial documents still require ‘hard’ copies, ‘wet’ signatures, and physical transportation either by post or personal attendance at the time of signing.

This is a worldwide problem. In the UK alone this is a multi-billion pound issue.

This costly issue affects all market sectors, Government or Private, and all sizes of organisation, from those with only a few staff, up to those with tens of thousands of employees. Initially we will focus on meeting the needs of sectors which are; under strict compliance pressure, recognise the immediate mutual benefits, provide the greatest cost saving opportunity and automatic viral marketing within their communities.

PAOGA is addressing this opportunity with the first of a series of applications, giving verified individuals, in business or as consumers, control over such online transactions. PAOGA has created PAOGAperson as the lead application for individuals to have their electronic identity verified and a prerequisite for using PAOGAddx for secure communication and electronic signing of documents with ‘legal certainty’ for both parties. This replaces the need for a physical written signature, thus reducing time, costs, error and, of course, the risk of data abuse. PAOGAddx is obviously relevant to many other sectors and other applications are planned.

This new 2-way paradigm significantly reduces the time, cost and risk for businesses whilst maintaining a ‘trusted relationship’ between buyer and seller.

PAOGA is in the vanguard of a new wave of user-centric services enabling the fast growing online community to make informed judgements when entering into digital relationships and controlling the use of their personal information. Certain businesses have been gathering as much data as possible and we, the data subjects, have been oblivious to the risks and future consequences. We are now at the point where the Personal Information of a European Citizen is currently stored in over 1,000 data silos around the world (According to research by Privacy International and Virtual Identity and Privacy Research Centre, Switzerland - 2009). This is not data shared willingly in exchange for a product or service - this is the result of your data being stolen, harvested and sold without your knowledge or permission. It is this 'hijacked' data which is the source of spam (85% of internet traffic), phishing and fraud. Recent privacy concerns around Social Networking sites combined with intrusive targeted advertising mean that there a rapidly growing market of individuals who want to take back control and responsibility for managing their valuable personal information in the same way that over a billion of us worldwide now manage our financial information online.

PAOGA provides individuals with their own secure Personal Data Store, like a digital Safe Deposit Box, in which they can record, access, manage and share relevant Personal Information and important documents with an audit trail of what information was shared with whom, when and why.